Oral Answers to Questions

Jack Straw: May I say to the hon. Gentleman that a great many offences in the criminal calendar are based on common law—they trace their provenance to decisions of the courts made, in this case, in the 18th century. Such offences are continually redefined and refined by the higher courts of the land. There have been two leading authorities, among others, published on the definition of misconduct in public office—one in 1979 and another in 2004. Although the Committee on Standards in Public Life considered the matter, it recommended only a partial replacement of the offence of misconduct. As I have reported to the House, the Joint Committee on the Draft Corruption Bill considered whether to propose the inclusion of a statutory definition of misconduct in public office, but decided against doing so.

European Affairs

David Miliband: The hon. Lady makes an important point. I had a long and detailed bilateral meeting with the Polish Foreign Minister about this last month in Brussels. Poland is very dependent on coal. I therefore hope that what I am about to say about carbon capture and storage speaks directly to her point.
	The Prime Minister will argue at the Council for a durable funding mechanism to encourage investment in carbon capture and storage. The 2007 agreement included a commitment to build up to 12 demonstration plants by 2015. With global emissions from coal set to increase by 73 per cent. to 2030, it is critical that we develop the technology and apply it at scale. The European Parliament has proposed that allowances form the new entrant reserve of the emissions trading scheme should be set aside to support CCS projects. We have given this proposal our full support, and it goes a long way towards meeting the Polish fear about its very unusual coal dependency and offers a way to square the circle of energy security and tackling carbon emissions.

William Hague: I think that the hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case about Zimbabwean asylum seekers, but I would want my home affairs colleagues to make any Conservative party commitments. The hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case, as I said, but this and future Governments will have to ensure that any decisions are made in line with a robust overall asylum policy. We should have regard to what the hon. Gentleman says, but all cases have to be considered on their merits.
	The severity of the economic downturn's impact on each country has depended on how well the Governments of each country have prepared for less easy times—in other words, on whether they fixed the roof while the sun was shining, which did not happen in this country.
	When he was Chancellor, the Prime Minister used to enjoy lecturing other European Governments on how to run their economies, and was notorious at ECOFIN meetings for his patent lack of interest in anything that they had to say. I hope that when he goes to the summit on Thursday he will show a bit of humility and contrition. I know that there is very little chance of that: I merely express a hope that the Prime Minister will begin to show those attributes.
	The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development predicts that Britain will experience the steepest rise in unemployment in the G7. The European Commission has said that this country will experience the deepest recession of any nation in the G7. After 16 years of global economic growth, the United Kingdom has entered the present downturn with a larger budget deficit than more than 100 other countries, including countries such as Kazakhstan and Uganda.
	According to the European Commission's autumn economic forecast—the Foreign Secretary quoted a few percentages and statistics—Britain's cyclically adjusted budget balance will be minus 5 per cent. next year and minus 5.5 per cent. in 2010, compared to minus 0.3 per cent. in Germany and a surplus in Germany subsequently. That might be why Mrs. Merkel was not at the meeting yesterday.
	Each European Union member state's appropriate response to the downturn is determined by its domestic situation and, of course, domestic views. The European Commission was absolutely right to emphasise that in its announcement on economic recovery, when it said
	"Those that have used the good times to achieve stable public finances have most room for manoeuvre."
	Such a sharply pointed reminder that Governments that failed to put public finances on a sound basis now have very little room to manoeuvre ought to have caused some pain in Downing street.

William Hague: I have taken a number of interventions, and I will give way to the hon. Gentleman later, if he behaves; that might be unlikely, but we will see how he gets on.
	As I was saying, a truly bizarre development has been the sight of members of the Cabinet returning to advocating the one measure that, as the hon. Member for Luton, North said, would have made matters even worse for this country: membership of the euro. Since eurozone interest rates have been held at lower levels than those of this country for many years, it is fair to assume that if they had been applied to this country they would have made the unsustainable boom in our housing market even worse, and since those interest rates have been cut more slowly than British interest rates in recent weeks, it is also fair to assume that membership of the eurozone would now be making our dramatic bust even worse. So while the Prime Minister's claim to have abolished boom and bust is already a matter of ridicule, it is clear that a boom-boost cycle in the British economy would have been exacerbated, rather than dampened, by eurozone membership.
	None of this has stopped the dear noble lord, Lord Mandelson, who seems to be taking over ever wider swathes of the Government's foreign and economic policy—the Foreign Secretary had better watch out on that score—from reminding the nation that the Government are committed to euro membership in future. Nor has it stopped some of the "people who matter", in the words of Mr. Barroso, the President of the European Commission, from telling him that Britain is warming to the euro.
	What makes this even more ridiculous is that the shockingly incompetent management of the nation's finances by the current Government means that Britain will soon not be eligible to join the euro, since our Budget deficit is ballooning way beyond the Maastricht criteria and our national debt is heading for a level that, if any of the massive off-balance-sheet liabilities of the Government are included, will take us outside the euro's entry criteria. Is it not a pretty damning summing up of this Government's conduct of our nation's affairs that they are reaffirming their dogmatic commitment to a policy that would have made matters worse, while bringing such ruin on this country that they would no longer meet the rules for implementing it anyway? That is now the Government's policy on the euro.

William Hague: My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. It looks as if we will fall behind Italy soon, in terms of the size of the national economy, and that will be the legacy of this Government, who have broken all records in economic indebtedness and damaging the competitiveness of this country.

William Hague: I have given way to the hon. Gentleman already, and in fairness to the rest of the House, because I have a number of issues that I wish to raise, I should proceed.
	One of the reasons we oppose the Lisbon treaty is that we believe that the EU does not need more powerful institutions, but that it needs the will and capacity to take action. That is true of a number of foreign policy areas, on which I think there will be less disagreement between those on the Government and Opposition Front Benches than there has been on the topics that I have raised so far. On some issues, the EU risks sending the wrong signals not through any lack of institutions or treaties but through a lack of appetite to face up to some serious challenges. One such challenge, of course, is the Iranian nuclear programme, on which we have called for and the Government have sometimes sought more serious and wide-ranging EU-wide sanctions. Since that subject falls more properly in the debate on international affairs we shall have tomorrow, I shall return to the subject then, but a couple of other major foreign policy challenges are more closely bound up in European affairs, one of which is the western Balkans.
	The Foreign Secretary and I both recently toured the Balkans, where I think we both received a warm reception from the new government of Serbia, from President Tadic downwards. The election of a Government in Belgrade who are looking to strengthen their ties with EU nations and the EU and the arrest of Radovan Karadzic are hugely positive steps that underscore the extent to which the prospect of EU membership can help to entrench democracy and open economies in countries that have only recently had the opportunity to establish those things. Of course, we now look to Belgrade to take action to extradite the remaining war criminals.
	I know that the Foreign Secretary also shares our alarm at the deadlock in Bosnia and Herzegovina. We in the Opposition have drawn attention to that, and the right hon. Gentleman and the Czech Foreign Minister have rightly drawn their colleagues' attention to it. We warmly support his action in that regard, which was consequently discussed at last month's General Affairs Council.
	The deadlock in Bosnia and Herzegovina continues to concern us because, despite the signing of the stabilisation and association agreement between Bosnia and the EU, the situation remains very fragile. Given everything that has happened in Bosnia in the past, and the huge efforts eventually made to allow the people of that country to establish themselves in peace and greater prosperity, I hope that the Foreign Secretary agrees that there is an absolute need for a tough EU approach. That approach must have the carrot of eventual EU accession, as well as the stick of robust reactions to threats to Bosnia's stability and sovereignty.
	That is why we were concerned when EU Defence Ministers suggested in early October that the small remaining force of international troops in Bosnia would be withdrawn imminently. It is also why we are reassured to know that the decision was taken at the UN Security Council on 20 November to renew the force's mandate for a year, but I hope that Ministers will make it clear that, if necessary, that mandate should be extended further. That would make sure that the clear message goes to political leaders in Bosnia that backsliding will not be allowed and that the renewal of violence there will not be permitted.
	We have a parallel concern about the situation in Kosovo. The Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mike Gapes), raised this matter, and the Foreign Secretary gave a helpful explanation of the position of the 2,000-strong EULEX mission. We have been worried that there is a serious danger that if the deployment of EULEX is status neutral it may not be able to implement the Ahtisaari plan on the future status of Kosovo. That would lead to de facto separation of the northern part of Kosovo under the UN, from the rest of Kosovo under the EU.
	When the Minister for Europe winds up the debate, I hope that she will additionally clarify the following point: is it the case that the police, customs and courts in Serbian enclaves will be under UN jurisdiction, while EULEX will be in charge of areas with a majority Albanian population? If not, we will welcome the assurances about EULEX. Are the Government confident that the arrangements will not result in a de facto partition of Kosovo?

Mike Gapes: I am grateful for that intervention, which gives me the opportunity to say that I recently met the leader of the Albanian opposition, who was on a visit here, and engaged in constructive discussions. I am sure that many people in Albania, in government and in opposition, are working together to resolve the difficulties. We need to be aware that there are still difficulties, and the hon. Gentleman has rightly pointed out that the Council of Europe, other organisations and individual Governments will work to try to assist the remarkable process that the Albanian people have made since the regime of Enver Hoxha. We need to think back; the difference between where the country was 20 years ago and where it is today is remarkable. Sometimes, we take the changes since 1989 for granted.
	When the Berlin wall came down in 1989, I was in Warsaw at a Socialist International meeting. On 9 November that year, I was visiting President Jaruzelski and Prime Minister Mazowiecki. I remember that the only person who predicted that Germany would unify quickly was Rakowski, the communist leader, who said, "Mark my words—Germany will be united within a year." Everyone else said that there would be a confederation and that unification would take time, yet in 10 months Germany was united.
	The remarkable changes of less than 20 years ago are coming to a culmination. Countries that came out of the breakdown of the cold war and the ending of the bloc system—or the ending of national isolation, such as that of Albania—are coming into the democratic, pluralistic European Union. That is precious. We should work to make sure that it continues, because it provides political stability as well as economic prosperity to all the millions of people in central and eastern Europe.

Edward Davey: I think that that was supposed to be a helpful intervention, but we know what President-elect Obama wants to do. He wants to do the sort of things that Britain, France and the European Union are doing. He has said that clearly on the record.
	There has been some debate in the press, and earlier in our proceedings, about the position of the Germans on the fiscal stimulus. The Foreign Secretary read out figures referring to 1 per cent. of GDP and so on. Yesterday, I was privileged to be able to speak to some German parliamentarians who gave me the true facts behind the German stimulus package and told me how they thought things were working in the Bundestag. The €50 billion stimulus package that has been put forward contained many measures that they were going to introduce any way, so it really does not amount to 1 per cent. of GDP. It was fair for the Foreign Secretary to read out those figures, but they do not quite stand up to the analysis he provided.
	However, Chancellor Merkel is having a few problems, and it is clear that she might be changing her mind as the hours tick by. She has called a crisis meeting with the German equivalent of the CBI on Sunday, and as German output is plummeting, the cries that action be taken by the German Government are getting louder. I hope that by Thursday or Friday, Chancellor Merkel might have moved on a bit and that our Government will therefore keep the pressure on. The problem is that she is slightly trapped—as is the Finance Minister who is her Social Democrat partner—by probably the only political pledge that they gave in order to have a balanced budget. Electoral problems—internal domestic German politics, not economic rationale—are actually preventing the Germans from going for the stimulus. Let us be absolutely clear about that. We have got to persuade both the Chancellor and her colleague that it is in their political interest, and in Germany's interest, to join in with this stimulus. If that can be done, it will be far more effective.
	The other issue relating to the economic crisis in Europe is the position of the euro, and the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks had some fun on that point. There are different views on that, both in this House and across Europe. Many of the smaller European countries have looked at Iceland and Denmark and said, "We're really delighted that we are in the euro." Talks with the bigger countries have also revealed that they are pleased because the euro has meant that there have not been big depreciations in the weaker economies, which would have caused problems for the German economy and the other big economies, and made their recovery much more difficult. There is a strong argument to suggest that the euro has been a good thing for those who are already in it.
	The next few months and years will be a testing and interesting time because we will see whether the euro is as strong as those of us who agree with it believe it to be. There is no doubt that the test for the euro was always going to be the first major recession—and this will, I fear, be the recession of all recessions. If the euro can withstand a recession, it will show that an optimal, single currency area in Europe is completely sustainable. The pressures that exist have already been shown by what has happened in the bond market and the fact that the different yields on bonds between Germany and some of the other weaker economies have been increasing in recent weeks, particularly in Italy, Spain and Greece, which is not surprising given the problem of their debts. However, no one is talking about those countries being forced to leave the single currency, and that is a fascinating and significant fact. Who knows whether that will still be the case in a years' time, but if the euro does survive with all the current member states intact, that will—

Edward Davey: In a second. I was waiting for the hon. Gentleman to intervene and if he lets me finish this sentence, I will bring him in. If the euro does survive this period, that will make a strong case for it and some of the people who have been opposed to Europe will have great difficulty knocking that down.

David Wilshire: I am grateful for the opportunity to give the House a rare treat. The right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane) and I agree with each other. The hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey) has not given an answer to the right hon. Gentleman's entirely valid point that it is entirely up to the Ukrainians and the Georgians to apply for whatever they want to apply for. The answer that we have heard is that it is our right to say no, but would the hon. Gentleman care to answer this question? Is it their independent right, without interference by anyone else, to apply?

Ann Clwyd: I want to talk mainly about Turkey this evening. I want to do so because although I welcome Turkey's application to join the European Union and I hope that it is successful, there are certain conditions that must be met before it joins.
	A few weeks ago, I was invited to give an address at the memorial service of a very notable Turkish politician who was the former Deputy Prime Minister of the country: Erdal Inonu. He was the son of a former President of Turkey, who followed Ataturk as the second President. I mention that because although it might appear from what I shall say today that I am only a critic of Turkey, I am in fact also a long-time friend of Turkey.
	I chaired for three years the Inter-Parliamentary Union's committee on the human rights of parliamentarians. Before that, I served on the committee for a further three years. At almost each session of the IPU conferences—which took place twice a year—Turkey would appear before our committee as one of the countries that was oppressing its own elected politicians. We had a long-running battle with the Turks on the issue of Kurdish politicians, who were put in prison for little more than the kind of freedom of expression that all of us as elected politicians take for granted. Eventually, some of those politicians were released, only to be charged again on various counts.
	A few days ago, one of those politicians, Leyla Zana—the name may be familiar to Members who follow Turkish human rights matters closely—was sentenced again to 10 years in prison by a Turkish court in Diyarbakir. The court ruled that she had violated the penal code and the anti-terror law in nine speeches, one of which was given here in the House of Commons.
	Leyla Zana is accused of having supported, and spread propaganda in favour of, the PKK—the Kurdistan Workers Party. At a celebration in Diyarbakir, she stated that the PKK leader, Abdullah Ocalan, should be regarded as one of three Kurdish leaders. That is, I think, a perfectly acceptable point of view, even though Ocalan is rightly in jail for having been involved in many of the terrorist attacks that took place in Turkey. I am pleased to hear that he is now out of solitary confinement. Leyla Zana will, of course, appeal against the verdict.
	I mentioned Mr Inonu because he was the first Turkish politician to bring Leyla Zana into his party and into Parliament. That was the first instance of Kurds, mainly from the south-east of Turkey, being elected as Kurds in the Parliament. That was in 1991. Her decision at that time to take the parliamentary oath in Kurdish led to immediate calls for her arrest. She actually took the oath in Kurdish and Turkish, which is not unlike what I did when I was first admitted to this House; I took the oath in English and Welsh, and there was no threat to arrest me after doing that.
	That was the first time that Kurdish had been spoken in the Turkish Parliament. Leyla Zana was sentenced to 15 years in prison, but was released in 2004 due to international pressure. She received a lot of international prizes. She was awarded an international prize in 1994 and the Sakharov prize the following year. Despite her personal sufferings and losses during the 10 years of imprisonment—her husband and her children have had to leave Turkey and are in another country—she has continued to speak on behalf of her own people. Since her release in 2004, she has done so on every possible occasion. One such occasion was a meeting in this House of Commons. I was not present, but I am told that it was where she made one of the nine speeches for which she has been convicted again.
	What Leyla Zana asks for is recognition for the Kurdish language and Kurdish identity, and freedom of expression, in addition to political and cultural rights. She seeks a non-violent and democratic solution for the Kurds living within Turkey's borders.
	A few months before, I had visited south-east Turkey for the first time in seven years. On the previous occasion, I had been there with the Select Committee on International Development, when we examined the support that the British Government were providing through export credit guarantees for the Ilisu dam in Turkey, which is a highly controversial development. The dam would result in the displacement of 80,000 people, mainly Kurds. They are told that they will receive compensation, but this plan has been around for a large number of years and nobody to whom I have spoken in south-east Turkey knows what the compensation will be. Organisations such as the World Bank, the United Nations and so on no longer give support for dam developments of this kind, which displace so many people. As a result of the International Development Committee's report, the then Secretary of State for Trade and Industry rightly decided to withdraw British support for export credit guarantees. Since then, several other countries have also withdrawn their support, the latest being Germany—I think that the only country providing support is Switzerland.
	I had lunch with Leyla Zana, who is regarded as a terrorist. I first met her when she was serving her prison sentence in Ankara. The prison governor allowed me two and a half hours with her, during which we discussed her situation. She had been given a small patch of land to garden, but as any hon. Member who knows prisons in Turkey will be aware, that prison was not a pleasant place to be for 10 years. The prison governor himself said to me at the time, "She should not be here." It was obvious to everybody, except the Turkish Government, that she should not have been in prison.
	After 10 years, due to international pressure, Leyla Zana was released. She still holds the same views; nothing has changed. A growing number of terrorist attacks are being carried out in south-east Turkey. The number of people who have been killed in that civil war so far is 30,000 to 45,000, including more than 20,000 Kurdish guerrillas, 5,000 Turkish soldiers and security force members and 5,000 civilians—of course, millions of people have been uprooted.
	Those of us who understand the importance of culture and language really understand how the Kurds in south-east Turkey feel. I am not saying that this is the entire answer to the problem, but I believe that if the Turkish Government made more moves to meet the social and cultural needs of the Kurds in south-east Turkey, that would diffuse some of the support that many people in that region give the PKK. I spoke to a mayor of a town—I will not mention it or him by name, in case he lands up in jail—who told me that his brother was fighting in the mountains and that he was ready to send his son to fight in the mountains too. The strength of feeling had grown enormously in the six or seven years since I was last in the region.
	I had various conversations with people in the Turkish Government, but the situation was difficult for Ankara—it still is—at the time I was there because the Government were focused on their own existence. They had been in trouble with the courts and there was a possibility that the Government of the ruling AK party would be dissolved. But, of course, Ankara has, for decades, denied the existence of more than 12 million ethnic Kurds and has forced them to hide their customs, language and very identity or face charges of treason. That discrimination against one fifth of the country's population was institutionalised in the 1920s, with the founding of the Turkish republic, which was committed to imposing a uniform national identity.
	The persecution of the Kurds escalated dramatically in the 1980s, as the PKK gained strength. In 1991, at the height of that persecution, Leyla Zana became the first and only Kurdish woman elected to Turkey's Parliament since the foundation of the republic—I have already mentioned what she was then jailed for. She had taken the first steps on the path to Ankara central closed prison, which I can assure hon. Members is a pretty ghastly place.
	As anybody who visits south-east Turkey will realise—I took our ambassador there; our ambassador was fairly new and had not been to the south-east before—to many Kurds, Leyla Zana is a modern-day Joan of Arc, a champion of human rights for her people. Her critics see her as a separatist puppet, ill-trained for a Government post and obsessed with challenging the official myth that no ethnicity except Turk exists in Turkey.
	When Leyla Zana was 15, she married the former mayor of Diyarbakir, Mehdi Zana, and developed her political consciousness the hard way; he was jailed during the military rule in 1980 for the promotion of the Kurdish cause, and she and her children visited him in prison. She told a journalist:
	"We were always met with brutal and inhuman pressure".
	She said that the Turkish guards beat them. She said:
	"They banned speaking in Kurdish. When we told them that we did not speak Turkish, they bluntly told us to look in each others' eyes, and that would suffice."
	I do not know whether any hon. Members have seen Harold Pinter's "Mountain Language," but it is an exceptional play lasting only about an hour and half, and I saw it at the National Theatre. It involves only three people—a Kurdish mother, her son, who is in jail, and the jailer. The mother, who speaks Kurdish only, is unable to speak to her son throughout her visit to the jail, because Kurdish is prohibited and only Turkish is allowed. The play is stunning and once one has seen it, the message becomes clear.
	From the time of those visits, Zana began to fight back. In 1984, when her children were old enough, she started school. In three years, she made progress very quickly and she then took a job with the newly established Human Rights Association in Diyarbakir. In the course of defending the rights of her imprisoned husband and other detainees, Zana herself fell victim to official brutality. She said:
	"I was detained during a protest in front of Diyarbakir prison in 1988...For seven days I was interrogated under torture. I was forced to take off my clothes and was brutally beaten."
	Zana subsequently ran for parliament and won a seat in 1991 on an SHP coalition ticket—the SHP is the sister party of the Labour party, it is a member of Socialist International and it was Inonu's party. After her open embrace of Kurdish rights before a national audience, an outraged military—one should never forget how strong the military are in Turkey—applied pressure to the SHP. She and the other SHP deputies were forced out of the party and founded the Democracy party.
	Zana kept her seat for three years while the Ankara state security court's public prosecutor pushed the National Assembly to lift parliamentary immunity from prosecution for the Democracy party deputies. In March 1994, Parliament accepted the charge that Democracy party members were affiliated with the PKK and lifted their immunity. Authorities interrogated Zana for two weeks and charged her with affiliation to the PKK. Before the year was out, the Ankara state security court convicted Zana and the three other former Democracy party deputies that I mentioned—Hatip Dicle, Selim Sadak and Orhan Dogan—of membership of an armed gang, and sentenced each to 15 years imprisonment. The then Prime Minister, Tancu �iller, justified the incident as the PKK's dismissal from Parliament. The Democracy party was outlawed, and other former MPs went into exile in Belgium.
	Zana spent 10 years of her young life in prison, and has now been convicted for another 10 years. She spent her time in prison reading, studying, writing letters to supporters and tending to her little garden. She hardly ever sees her children, because they now live in another country. I met her daughter and asked her whether she wanted to go into politics like her mother. She shook her head violently and said, No, I want to be an IT consultant.
	In the south-east of Turkey, everybody talks about Leyla Zana. She has become a role model and a source of pride for Kurdish women. She is often credited with improving their position in the patriarchal Kurdish society. After her example, Kurdish women feel more encouraged to break with the old traditions of obeying their men and devoting their lives to housekeeping. It must be said that those traditions do pervade Kurdish culture. The most interesting point about studies of Kurdish nationalism, especially in the Ottoman empire, is that they are only about men and do not mention women at all. Under the weight of its historical traditions, Kurdish society has very paternal characteristics. It is highly probable that a foreigner browsing through those studies would gain the impression that Kurdish society is composed only of men. It is as though no Kurdish woman lived between the legendary warrior, Black Fatma, who fought in the Crimean war in the 1850s and Leyla Zana herself.
	Zana has paid a high price for her place in history. Although she suffers from a blood circulation disorderduring her first period in prison she required frequent visits to the prison clinicshe told her lawyer to play down her ill-health. Whenever we met the Turkish delegations at the IPU human rights commission, they would tell me that Leyla Zana had been offered the option of leaving prison early on grounds of ill-health, but she refused it. She wanted to win her freedom on the justice of her cause.
	Globally, several human rights organisations have raised the profile of all the MPs. Amnesty International named Leyla as a special focus case and members of the US Congress and of several European Parliaments nominated her for the Nobel peace prize. As I said, she won the Sakharov prize.
	Turkey's internal political climate has changed significantly as fears of militant Kurdish separatism diminished after Ocalan was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment. Turkey also wants to join the European Union. However, from the evidence of my visits to the south-east of Turkey over the past six years, that desire has somewhat diminished. The Turks are a proud people and they feel that they are being snubbed by the international community. Nevertheless, they have had to make changes in many of their laws to attempt to comply with European Union membership.
	On paper, the reforms have been encouraging. The ban on broadcasting in Kurdish was lifted, with certain qualifications, in 2001 and 2002. Other legal changes allow for the teaching of languages, including Kurdish, but the authorities have yet to approve any courses in Kurdish. Despite recent reforms, the Turkish authorities still appear to view the legitimate requests of Kurdish citizens for linguistic and cultural rights as a danger to Turkish territorial integrity. Of course, people such as Leyla Zana continue to pay the price. She still advocates co-operation and fraternity between all of Turkey's people. She has said:
	Peace, once attained, will bring women, Kurdsand Turks as wellinnumerable opportunities for developing their human capacities.
	She has lived that lesson.
	People living in the south-east of Turkey still have enormous problems. The mayor of Diyarbakir told me that freedom of speech was slipping away in the region, and people were not allowed to use the Kurdish language in many official situations, so a lot of resentment was building up. That fuelled support for the PKK and harmed relations with neighbouring countries, such as Iraq. When I met the deputy chair of the parliamentary foreign affairs committee, he said that he understood that to defeat the PKK, the Government had to address the grievances of the Kurds in the south-east. Military means alone would not be successful. That is the clear message. If the Turks really want to solve the problems of south-east Turkey, people cannot be prosecuted for using the letter w in an official invitation written in both Kurdish and Turkish because it is not part of the Turkish alphabet. People should not be arrested for singing Kurdish songs or using their own language in official situations. All the groups I talked to in the south-east were strongly opposed to the building of the Ilisu dam, which had little or no consultation.
	Last week, the European Council, in its report on accession, discussed enlargement and mentioned Turkey in particular. It said:
	The Council is disappointed to note that over the year just passed Turkey has made only limited progress, particularly as regards political reforms.
	Substantial efforts to ensure that Turkey meets the Copenhagen criteria must be made in several fields, such as continued judicial reform; establishing an anti-corruption strategy; effective protection of citizens' rights; full implementation of a policy of zero tolerance of torture and ill-treatment; ensuring freedom of expression and religion in law and in practice for all religious communities; respect for property rights; respect for and protection of minorities; strengthening of cultural rights, women's rights, children's rights and trade union rights; and the civilian authority's control of the military.
	As regards the south-east of Turkey, the Council takes note of the Turkish Government's decision to complete the south-eastern Anatolia projectthe GAPand emphasises the need to implement measures to ensure economic, social and cultural development. The Council, like us all, condemns all terrorist attacks and violence in Turkish territory in the strongest terms possible and expresses its full solidarity with the people of Turkey. The EU reiterates that it absolutely supports Turkey in its fight against terrorism, which must be conducted with due regard for human rights, fundamental freedoms and international law while preserving regional peace and security.
	The European Parliament has also written a draft report on the Council's report as it affects Turkey. It contains a series of points about human rights as well as about the need for respect for and the protection of minorities. It is only a draft report, but it will be coming before the European Parliament shortly.
	I strongly support Turkish membership of the EU. It would be good for Turkey and for the rest of the EU, too. However, it must meet some provisions. There must be faster movement on reform. There must be respect for the cultural and linguistic rights of KurdsI can hardly describe the Kurds in Turkey as a minority, since they make up 12 million of the population. It is incumbent on us all to keep putting pressure on the Turkish Government to meet the criteria that the EU would wish Turkey to meet if it is to join.
	I have great affection for Turkey and its people. Since they were ruled by the military, which was not all that long ago, the IPU has been quite patient with Turkey. We have congratulated them when there has been progress and we have given them a sharp kick when we think that they could be making greater progress in certain areas.
	Finally, on Leyla Zana, the IPU sent people to her first trial. They said that she had a totally unfair trial and that her defence counsel was not given the proper opportunity to put the case on her behalf. When she was sentenced, there was an appeal. The same judge who made the judgment in the first case started the case off by saying, I was the judge at her first trial, and I am not going to change my mind. Whatever new arguments there were, he had already made it clear that he would not change his mind.
	If Leyla Zana comes before a court again, I shall be very concerned. As things are in Turkey, she will not get a fair trial. When she was sentenced last week, her defence counsel was not there. He had been told that the trial would start later in the day, and was then phoned about 10 minutes before the trial started to be told that it was starting. He asked for a bit more time, and I think that he was given 10 minutes. When they went back to the court, the trial had already taken place. Leyla Zana's defence counsel, once again, was unable to put the argument on her behalf. I have deep concerns about that case, and I hope that we will all lobby on behalf of all those who should be getting proper human rights in Turkey and who are not.

David Wilshire: May I start with a provisional apology to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and to the House? I have an important engagement during the course of the evening. If the debate runs its course I shall, of course, be back in the Chamber for the end, but should it finish early I might have difficulty in doing so. I apologise if that turns out to be the case.
	My hon. Friends on the Front Bench can relax. I do not intend on this occasion to treat the House to my views on the European Union, although some will be disappointed to hear that. I have long since learned that it is sensible to have only one rebellion at a time, and my current rebellion focuses on Heathrow airport. I shall settle for that rebellion for the time being, although there may be another occasion at some stage in the future when I can come back to the European Union.
	Tonight, I want to confine my remarks to the subject of last year's war between two European nations. I have become very involved in the fall-out of that war. For my sins, if that is the right phrase, I am one of the five political group leaders in the Council of Europe, and that has taken me and my colleagues to Tbilisi twice, to South Ossetia once, to the buffer zone when the Russians were still there, to Gori, to MoscowI have been once and I am going againand to the United Nations in New York. The subject is clearly much on my mind.
	Although the subject might not immediately appear to be so, it is of some relevance to the summit that will take place at the end of this week. The European Union, commendably and quite rightly, has civilian monitors in Georgia. Most of us would wish that they were in South Ossetia, too, but I shall come back to that. The monitors are doing the best they can and they are at risk because the violence is resuming. We need to take that risk seriously.
	The dispute is far from settled, and if it were to become violent again the consequences for every member state in the European Union could easily become catastrophic. We got off lightly last time, and I do not think that we can assume that we might again. As Georgia wants to join the European Union, we have to discuss the matter. We welcome those who are able to join the European Union, but there have to be quite serious doubts about the timetable, if there ever was one, for Georgia. I hope that we will not turn our backs totally on Georgia but will discuss where we go from here. The subject is relevant to this debate, although it might not be everybody's top priority.
	How should the EU and every member state respond to what happened? I am one of those who do not believe that anything will be gained at this stage by playing the blame game. The facts are still in short supply and an independent inquiry is crucial. That is why I welcome what the EU has managed to achieve. I wish the inquiry well. In due course, when we have an independent international report, considering the issue of blame might become appropriate, but for now I do not think that it is. However, from my involvement thus far, I believe that it is sensible and safe for us to draw three interim conclusions.
	First, the war did not start on 7 August. The vicious fighting might have started on 7 August, but the war started a long time before that. Another safe interim conclusion is that both sides are at fault. Both sides entered into commitments when they joined the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the Council of Europe, and they have patently broken those commitments. It is also clearI have seen it with my own eyesthat there have been human rights violations on both sides. Both sides are at fault and I do not see the point of trying to say who is worse. The final interim conclusion that I have reached is that we allindividually, nationally and internationallyshare some of the responsibility for what happened. There were warning signs. Comments were made by both sides over a longish period. We might have heard them, but we did not seem to pay much attention to them. I believe that that will become one of the lessons to be learned.
	When this matter is discussed at the summit, as I trust it will be, I hope that the leaders ask themselves three really straightforward questions. How can they and we help the civilian victims on both sides? What should the EU say about Russia and Georgia to the Russians and the Georgians, and what should it do? How can we reduce the risk of further and future armed conflict in our continent? That is the first group of questions.
	As for the civilian victims, I have seen with my own eyes the destruction caused by both the Russians and Georgians in South Ossetia and the buffer zone. That was tragic and heartbreaking, but all I shall say is that bombs, shells and missiles do not discriminate between nationalities, or between the innocent and the guilty. They simply destroy everything and everybody. Thankfully, help has been and is still being sent: some of the internally displaced people have been rehoused, but there is still an enormous amount to be done. The onset of winter makes the crisis ever more crucial, and renders it ever more necessary that we ask what more we can do.
	There are three things that the summit might like to consider. It should consider how we can give more assistance, and how we can send more to help the people in the region. I am not criticising what has happened, but there is still more to be done. We can also ensure that the aid reaches the recipients for whom it is intended, and insist that those who wish to return to their own home should be allowed to do sounless, of course, they have been bulldozed by one side or the other.
	The second and third tasks that I have set out are not going as smoothly as they ought to. We have heard about the difficulties experienced by the Red Cross in getting deliveries to certain places. I find that unacceptable, but we have also found that people's access to their homes is being forbidden. That is especially true in the Kodori gorge region, a mainly Georgian area in Abkhazia where Georgians are finding it difficult to get into their homes. Again, Upper Gori in South Ossetia is essentially a Georgian town, but its inhabitants are finding it hard to get back home.
	We cannot allow that to continue, and we have to ask what is stopping people returning. One of the most crucial elements is the demand that people who wish to go back home must give up their Georgian citizenship and accept Russian passports. Some people say that that story is right, others that it is wrong, and still others claim that it has been invented, but I should like to share with the House the proof of its authenticity.
	I have in my hand a Russian passport, one of a batch of brand new passports captured from a Russian vehicle. All the passports claim to have been issued in 2004: they all have a complete name, as well as a proper photograph and seal. They are genuine Russian passportsexcept for the fact that none of them has been signed by the recipient. Not one of them had been asked for. I hope that the summit will say that that is unacceptable, and that we cannot tolerate people being kept out of their homes unless they do something quite unrealistic and unjustifiable.
	The second question that I hope that the summit asks is a really tricky onewhat do we do and say to the Russians and the Georgians? We must start with the very simple message that going to war in Europewhatever the reasons, circumstances and justificationis totally, utterly and completely unacceptable. Two countries went to war and it does not matter who is to blame, because we have to say, Up with that we will not put. It may be that one side or the other was provoked, but that does not matter: both sides used disproportionate force in whatever it was that they were trying to do, and neither can use the excuse, We were provoked so we had to respond.
	Both Russia and Georgia say regularly that they wish to join fully the family of democratic nation states in Europe. That is their wish, and it is mine too. I want to help both countries achieve that end, and I hope that the EU wants to help them too, but another clear message has to be sent: if Russia and Georgia want to join the Europe that we believe inthe Europe of democracy, human rights and the rule of lawthose principles are not negotiable. We will not make an exception because a country is small or big: our message must be, You are welcome into our family, but we're not going to negotiate and weaken what we believe in just to make it easier for you to join.
	When these matters are discussed, we must insist that President Sarkozy's six-point plan is implemented in full by both sides. Until that happens, we will not be in a position to make progress on anything else.
	As I said in an earlier intervention, I realise that the Council of Europe is one of those organisations that people sometimes forget exists, but its Parliamentary Assembly recently drew up a list of things that have to happen. When they joined the Council of Europe, both Russia and Georgia signed up to solemn commitments, one of which was not to use violence. I hope that the EU will join the Council of Europe in requiring that the list of things that the Council says has to happen must be achieved before any more progress can be made.
	Although there is a list of things that we can all do, I am not overly impressed by the progress that has been made thus far. I understand that it is in the EU's interest for us to resume negotiations on a partnership and co-operation agreement with Russia, but that would send the wrong signals. It would be to say, You can go to war with a neighbour and we'll still talk to you. I do not think that we should send that message. At last week's summit of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the Finnish presidency wanted an agreed statement to be issued. The presidency said that it was better to have no statement at the end of the summit if any attempt was made to water down the wording. What happened? There was no statement.
	Even the Council of Europe is not beyond criticism. The ambassadors, with the Swedish Chairman of the Committee of Ministers, had a list of things that they could do and needed to do, but they could not even bring themselves to vote on any of it. Thus far, the signals that we have sent have not been very promising, and I urge the summit to toughen up its act. As was said earlier in the debate, the Russians in particular are more willing to listen than we realise. They are more prepared to move than they might have been six or 12 months ago, and we should not miss the opportunity that we have with them.
	The third question that I urge the summit to ask is, What can we do to prevent further violent conflict? There are three lessons that we can learn from last year's war. The first has to do with frozen conflictsand God knows that there are enough of them in our continentbut we assume that they will stay frozen for ever at our peril. We need to revisit the whole issue, and all frozen conflicts.
	The second lesson is that we ignore the warning signs at our peril, irrespective of where they come from, and however overblown they might be. The third and perhaps most urgent lesson is that we would be fools to believe that a ceasefire marks the end of hostilities. We believe that at our peril. As I said at the outset, it is perfectly possible for the war to start again. We need only look at what is happening on the ground; low-scale violence on both sides is gradually moving to worse and more violence. That is how things started last time. If we do not do something to stop that, we are running a serious risk.
	There is an issue that the European Union has to rethink. Rightly and courageously, we sent civilian unarmed monitors to the region. They have not been allowed on both sides of the border, and because gunmen on both sides are staring each other in the face, those unarmed monitors are at risk as the violence ratchets up. There are EU monitors in the area, as well as the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, which is finding it difficult to get into South Ossetia. The United Nations is in Abkhazia. The time has come to bring all that together, and to say that we need armed peacekeepers on both sides of the border. We ought to discuss that with the United Nations in the first instance. That is not to criticise the EU unarmed monitors, but we are putting them at risk, and I do not think that they will solve the problem in the long term.
	I said at the outset that the conflict is probably not the top priority for the summit, but it has to be on the agenda. It is an EU issue, even though neither of the countries concerned is a member of the European Union. We must always bear it in mind that last August, two European countries once again went to war. Both had given solemn undertakings that they would do no such thing. Both had said, We want to build a country with democracy, human rights and the rule of law. Both said, We will settle disputes exclusively in a non-violent way, and both countries have broken their word. I hate to say it, but if the European Union, the OSCE and the Council of Europe do nothing on the back of that, we become a laughing stock.
	However, there is a risk of doing too much. If we do too much, and the result is that we throw people out of an organisation, or they choose to walk away from us, we can no longer talk to them. Democracy, human rights and the rule of law are values and concepts. We cannot force them on people. We can only encourage and help people to develop them, and we can only do that if we keep talking.

Jo Swinson: I am listening with interest to what the right hon. Lady says about how we fund the mitigation activities that are needed if we are to tackle climate change. Given that the Stern report pointed out that 1 per cent. of gross domestic product ought to be spent on such activities, surely it makes sense to use some of the auction revenue to fund those necessary activities. Otherwise, the money will have to come from somewhere else. Auction revenues may be one of the most painless places to get the money from.

William Cash: No, we do not, but we certainly do with the European Union. If we had a system of co-operation, we could co-operate with Europe and countries beyond it. I shall leave the issue at that.
	There have been quite a number of comments about the economic package, and I do not need to spend more than a few seconds on that. As I said in an intervention, the economic package has failed. The attitude adopted by the Conservative party leadership is right, and the German Government have clearly taken a similar line. It is a question of a stitch in time; by borrowing more, we will get into a position of facing intolerable taxation.
	I am afraid that there are the issues of the private finance initiative, nuclear decommissioning, public sector pensions in relation to Network Rail and a number of other issues, and they are all relevant to the money that the Government are to borrow. On pages 91 and 98 of their own pre-Budget report, the Government clearly indicated that they would include those as contingent liabilities in their report for next year. If we add in the contingent liabilities that the Government themselves have already accepted, and include the Maastricht arrangements to which I referred in my exchange with the Chancellor of the Exchequer, we see that the correct figure is not 1 trillion but 1.258 trillion. We are getting into astronomical figures of a kind that should truly concern any Member of this House. I have not heard anybody challenge those figures, although I have heard people chuckle at the idea that anybody might actually read a pre-Budget report and quote back to the Government what they have set out in it.
	The figures affect the Maastricht arrangements because the level at which a country can no longer go into the euro, in terms of percentage of debt as against national income, is 60 per cent., which happenssurprise, surpriseto be a mere 3 per cent. above the 57 per cent. at which the Government have pitched their figures. That was quite a nice little coincidence. I was intrigued that almost immediately after the pre-Budget report was issued up jumped Lord Mandelson, in effect urging peoplein concert with his old chum President Barroso, who certainly is not elected by usto join the euro, and the pressure again emerged for us to do so. However, the Government will not be able to do that, on any reasonable, competent analysis of the percentage of debt as against national income, because they cannot get anywhere near what is required. A great deal of thatnot all of it; I will be slightly generousis the Government's own fault. It is unwise for Conservative Members to say that it is all the Government's fault, but I would say that it is about 75 per cent. their fault, because they induced the situation and made it worse.
	Let me turn to defence. I made an interjectionI call it that rather an interventionon the Foreign Secretary when he referred to the remarks made about European defence by the NATO ambassador. Those remarks were wrong, because historically the relationship between ourselves and the United States has been built on NATO, for very sound reasons. Yes, we can and should have co-operation between ourselves and other countries in Europe, but I am bound to ask how much that has been worth given that our young lads are being killed in the south of Afghanistan when other countriesnot all of them, but someare not committing as they should in the situation in which our boys are being put at risk. The European Union must consider this before it starts grandstanding, as Nicolas Sarkozy is prone to do, about what it will do as a European defence organisation. It is a serious matter, because every week the Prime Minister has to get up at Prime Minister's Questions and tell us about the sad circumstances in which, as a matter of patriotic duty to this country and peace in the world, our young lads are going out there to fight. It is no good telling us that that can be done under the aegis of the European Union.
	I would strongly urge President-elect Barack Obama to consider the speech that he made in Berlin and subsequent remarks that have suggested, in effectthey may be misquotations; I make that point very stronglythat Britain should join up with this new European Union. I imagine that he would also mean, if he was not being misquoted, that it would be along the lines of the Lisbon treaty. I am sure that he is far too diplomatic to say anything directly, but I comment on it to this extent. Since 1947, United States policy on Europe has always been to encourage us to play a direct part in the integrated process. That has been proved to be wrong over an extended period.
	There are advantages to working within a European community or alliance. Contrary to what the Prime Minister frequently suggests when I intervene on him, which is that I am seeking withdrawal, that has not been my explicit objective at any time. I have always said that we need a renegotiation. That is implicit in the fact that this is a failing system. It is undemocratic and over-regulated. The Lisbon agenda does not work. Unemployment levels are enormous. The rise of the far right in parts of Europe is extremely disturbing. It is important to deal with this situation before becomes a crisis. The responsible approach would be for all the member states at the Council meeting that is about to take place to get together and see how they can create a new kind of Europe that would fulfil the criteria of association that I have suggested. If that is not done, I fear that the whole thing will come crashing down, and then we will get massive unemployment combined with all the circumstances that go with it, including disruption at local level that could cause no end of trouble for the people of Europe. We owe it to them to be responsible and not to allow Europe to go on turning itself into a compression chamber that will explode under the weight of the compression put into it.
	Over the years, the best policy that has been adopted is the kind of relationship that existed between Churchill and Roosevelt or Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. I am not going to decry the relationships between past Labour Governments and our friends in America, but we should be very clear that our advice to the United States is that we do not want to be part of a European Union along the Lisbon treaty lines or any other lines that frustrate and undermine the sovereignty of this Parliament, which was responsible, and will continue to be responsible, for standing up for the rights and freedoms of the people of Europe, as we have done in the past and will continue to do in future.
	I turn finally to the question of Georgia, Ossetia and Kosovo. I was deeply worried about the recognition of Kosovo. I know that I disagree with my Front-Bench colleagues about this. As far as I am aware, the matter has been referred to the International Court of Justice. Some of us who said that it was unwise are now being justified, because there is a serious problem about the way in which the European Union pressurised, organised and manipulated the arrangements that subsequently led to the declaration of independence. It is an internal problem as well as an external one. The same applied in relation to Ossetia and its neighbouring province. I am afraid that that, too, was precipitated by the actions in Kosovo. Although there may be blame on both sides, the reality is that one opens the Pandora's box of those sorts of countries at one's peril. This needs to be re-evaluated. We should not assume that merely because it has been done it will remain a matter of indifference to the people who live in those countries, because that is not so. As I understand it from a television programme that I saw, which seemed pretty convincing, the President of Georgia is being accused of war crimes, or at any rate the people under his direction or surveillance are being so accused, in relation to how they behaved in Georgia a few months ago.
	It seems to me that all is not well in the European Union. It would be far better if we could have a proper renegotiation at this Council. I have made the case for that on many occasions. I am not expecting it to happen; I am not holding my breath. I have to say that the situation is getting more critical. The financial package, and the financial situation, is generating more difficulties, and this is the time [ Interruption. ] I am so glad that the Minister for Europe has just come in. It is such a pleasure to see her. She very wisely stayed out during my speech. None the less, I will do my best to astonish her by saying that if I were asked, despite my deepest concerns about the sovereignty of the United Kingdom and the supremacy of this Parliament, which I thought was more important, today's debate or yesterday's debate on the question whether this House was sovereign over its internal affairs, I would saydifficult as it may be to draw a distinctionthat in principle, yesterday's debate, abortive as it was, was more important than the question of the supremacy of the European Union. If we do not get the matters that we debated yesterday right, and we have not yet, we will not be able to deal later on with the question of the supremacy of the United Kingdom Parliament.

Charles Kennedy: I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. It was nice of him, in a personal sense, and appropriategiven his own involvement in the Council of Europeto bring that insight to the House. It certainly coincides with the experiences that those of us who saw him in other ways had of the man himself.
	Today's debate, which was opened by the Foreign Secretary, immediately follows the mini-summitif that is the right termthat began the week, with President Sarkozy, our own Prime Minister and the President of the European Commission, President Barroso. I note the level of reassurance that the Foreign Secretary sought to give the House regarding the absence of the German Chancellor. One hopes that his reassurances are correct, because it would be a disaster, at a time of international recession affecting all our individual countries as well as the European Union and the rest of the globe, if there were any dislocation in the approach being pursued by the British, the French and the European Commission, or if there were any significant difference in the approach being pursued by the German Chancellor and her grand coalition. We have to guard against that. I say that from a pro-European standpoint, given the experience of several weeks ago, when the initial, more collective European efforts were unveiled. That strategy lasted barely 48 hours after the conclusion of proceedings on the continent, and, at that point, a very different approach was unveiled in Germany. We have to guard against that.
	There is a second factor that we must guard against. I welcome the Prime Minister's pivotal roleor certainly the role that his spin doctors have given himin co-ordinating European action, given the scale and severity of the financial crisis. It was useful and good that he hosted yesterday's summit, before attending the main leaders' summit at the end of the week. However, given this country's position outside the eurozoneI shall direct the bulk of my brief remarks tonight to that subjectthe co-ordination of those policies will not be reliant on one-off, headline-grabbing summit gatherings. It will involve the ongoing working of eurozone Finance Ministers.
	The Prime Minister was not noted for his overwhelming public outbursts of Euro-enthusiasm during his time at No. 11 Downing street. However, given the desperately serious situation, I am encouraged that he is apparently so engaged at European level. The fact remains, however, that as long as we are not full members of the group of eurozone Finance Ministers, there will be something of the country club member status about the British role in such proceedings. That is inescapable, because that is what the Government have opted for. I am not arguing about that, because there is no need to. I had that argument with Tony Blair over successive Parliaments many years ago, and we are where we are.
	The fact is that it is not sustainable or workable in the long term for Britain to play such a pivotal role at eurozone financial ministerial level when, as a result of our own decision, we are not full-scale members of the club. I am not going to recommend that we change that, because we cannot. I am not even going to suggest that it is desirable for us to do so, because it would not be. However, the Government need to be aware of that, given the status that they have opted for, and given the challenges that they have set themselves in the present context.
	I congratulate the newly arrived Minister for Europe, if I may so describe her, on her appointment and wish her well. I am speaking here not so much in a party capacity; that contribution has already been made. I am speaking more on behalf of the all-partyand, indeed, non-partyEuropean Movement, of which I serve as president at the moment. On behalf of its members in all parties in the House, as well as of its membership outside the House, I hope that the Government will continue to look favourably and constructively on its rolelimited though it is and modest, but realistic, though our ambitions and aspirations arein propagating a rational and constructive pro-European case within civic society in Britain. That role has been acknowledged by the Prime Minister from the Dispatch Box.
	The European Movement sought more than mere warm words from the Minister for Europe's predecessor. I do not know whether the file on that matter has made its way to the Minister's in-tray yet. If not, I am sure that it will do so as a result of these exchanges. The European Movement is now in its 60th year, and it used to receive a subvention direct from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. It feels rather sore about the fact that common sense prevailed during the days of Mrs. Thatcher andas some members of the Conservative party will be pleased to hearthat subvention was cut off. The organisation has not received a penny since. Given the heightened interest in matters European, and the role that members of all parties and those outside the House are seeking to play in the movement, one would have thought that a degree of support beyond mere rhetoric and warm words from the Government at the Dispatch Box and elsewhere could be favourably considered. I am not expecting an answer from the Minister tonight, but I know that representations have been made to the FCO and the Prime Minister from a variety of quarters.
	Unsurprisingly, in the context of this debate, reference has been made to the amazing effect that the reappearance of Peter Mandelson invariably seems almost instantaneously to engender in any context. Few have looked more pleased by Peter's reappearance than the Conservatives, and that was reflected in the shadow Chancellor's comments last week about Lord Mandelson being rumoured to have been the subject of the President of the European Commission's remarks about senior British politicians commenting to him favourably on the euro. Incidentally, there has never been the remotest piece of evidence to that effect. I have heard several very senior British Conservative politicians, among others, uttering precisely the same sentimentsnot just recently, but over the past 12 months or soall of whom have high-ranking pedigrees in former Tory Governments and have served in European capacities elsewhere as well. Anyway, the finger is now being pointed at Lord Mandelson, and I am never against his being blamed for things, whether he is guilty or not, because he is a master of that art himself.
	The fact is that, over-hyped though some of this might have been, it none the less highlights a significant truth that needs to be addressed a bit more rationally across the party political spectrum. Like it or notwe certainly all regret the circumstances that are giving rise to thisthe euro is slowly but surely beginning to become a topic of discussion and comment, if not yet of full-scale political debate, which would not have been anticipated 18 months or two years ago. I am the first to acknowledge that that is happening for all the wrong reasons. We did not want the deepening recession that seems ahead of us to be the trigger, but trigger it has, in some respects, proved to benot least in the precipitous fall in the level of the pound. When the currency is down more than 20 per cent. since the middle of the last calendar year, it is clear that something very dramatic is taking place. Although the source of the comments to which the President of the European Commission referred has undoubtedly been over-hyped, what cannot be over-hyped are the economic realities that this country faces.
	I speak as a non-economist. There are varying interpretations of Britain's current economic and financial plight, but as fairly as I can read the situation, the many who are contributing to the debate range from the gloomy at one end to the outright apocalyptic at the other. What is not in doubt, whether one's analysis is gloomy or apocalyptic, is that in coming years, according the Government's own recent statements, our economy will not meet any of the Maastricht convergence criteria, so to argue for entry into the euro now would be absurd and prematurebut that is not to say that attitudes cannot change with the passage of time.
	My hope is that we can be a little more rational than we were in the past and at least acknowledge that there could be circumstancesonly with the full engagement of the British public via a referendum process, so it would be a considerable number of years down the track and certainly not in the lifetime of this Parliamentin which we could revisit the euro issue.

Charles Kennedy: None more patient than me, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I dare say that an inference can be drawn from what the hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) says. I am thinking where I might hear such machinations outside this House, and I have to say that the hon. Gentleman is suggesting a level of considered conspiracy that I would usually associate only with the Liberal Democrat annual conference, where the leadership is concerned! The hon. Gentleman should take that as a compliment, because we have some of the best in the business when it comes to judging someone's motives at any given time.
	Matters move on. When the euro was introducedwithout, of course, British participationone un-named Eurosceptic currency trader, to cite someone whom the hon. Member for Stone might approve of, described the euro as a toilet currency. That rather reminded me of the Scottish politician who, when the late Donald Dewar published the original devolution proposals, described the envisaged blueprint for Scotland as a pygmy Parliament. Times move on, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and the politician who came out with that is as we speak serving as the First Minister in that so-called pygmy Parliament, as he chose to characterise it. I do not know what has happened to the Eurosceptic currency trader, but I suspect that recent events might well have flushed him away, because the euro has certainly not been flushed away.
	One is reminded of the leader of the Conservative party during the general election of 2001, when I was leader of my party, too. That former leader spoke, of course, as shadow Foreign Secretary this afternoon. However, the recurrent and repeated slogan of the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), as each day passed during the 2001 general election, was that there were only x number of days left to save the pound. Here we are at the end of 2008, and although I have been on a different side of the argument from the right hon. Gentleman since 2001, the pound is still very much with us.
	The shadow Foreign Secretary rather reminded me at the time of the 40 or so days of the 2001 campaignand he certainly has in the eight or so years sinceof one of the fanatical groups that go up to the top of mountains to say that the world is coming to an end at a certain time one afternoon, only to have to go back down the mountain rather shame-facedly when, funnily enough, the sun keeps rising in the east and setting in the west. The right hon. Gentleman no longer speaks about saving the pound, because it has not gone away, but his comments and predictions today should be taken in that contexthis track record is not at all persuasive.
	The euro, then, is still with us and I think it can be judged to have been a success. The verdict may be mixed overall, but it remains a success. It has certainly not been the terrible failure that was predicted, any more than those who predicted the end of the pound have proved to be correct. If we recall some of the arguments against joining the euro at the time, we can see that some of the arguments have moved on. Time does not allow me to get into a great debate to disprove some of the arguments, but we were told, for example, about the housing market and mortgage finance and how different they were from the rest of Europe's. Well, how dramatically different is all that now and how much more different will it become in the period ahead, as we know from the scale and speed of recent events in that sector!
	We were also told about the funded nature of British pensions in comparison with continental Europe, but where lies that argument today? Suddenly, there has been a gross realisation within British society of the vast underfunding in our pensions sector. Great emphasis was understandably laid on the importance of the financial services industry. I agree: that is a correct and valid point, but everybody is now singing from the same hymn sheet to the effect that the financial services sector will have to change its ways and conduct itself and its business quite differently from what would have been assumed to be the case only a few years ago.
	Then there was the UK's dependence on oil. Oil production peaked in 1999 and it has almost halved since then. Once again, those economic calculations have moved on.
	Not one of thosestill less taken together, or even if we added more stillmakes a case for membership of the euro. That is not my argument. What they do make a case for, however, is to keep it under consistent rolling review and to prepare better for a more informed public discussion and debate as and when it becomes appropriate to do soprobably a few years hence.
	There are reasons why it makes no sense to join the euro quicklyobviously, in a recession, it would be ludicrous to start pegging our currency to fixed rates or targets at a time of uncertainty in the currency markets. Moreover, there is that great court of opinion out there that is still to be won over. We know that public opinion is deeply sceptical and cynical about any such move, which presents a huge job to those of a pro-European intent of whatever political persuasion even to get the facts of the case across. That is why joining the euro cannot be a policy, but it should remain a strategy and it should remain a legitimate aspiration for better times, years down the line, whatever Government are in power, underpinned by a confident vote from the British public as a whole.
	The more we can move the debate in that direction, the better it will be. It is sad that it has taken such calamitous circumstances for the debate to begin to make its way back to the desired level, but, for all the reasons I have given, it has done so. It now behoves the House and all other participants to contribute in a constructive and informing manner for the benefit of those who will be most affected by it, and, at the end of the day, those are our fellow citizens.

Nigel Evans: I am delighted to follow the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Mr. Kennedy), particularly given his stirring tribute to Russell Johnston. May I add to something that I said in an intervention on the right hon. Gentleman? I consider Russell Johnston to have been a good European in both the European Union and the Council of Europe style, but I also remember his ending a five-day mission to Palestine and immediately travelling to Strasbourg in order to be present for the tail end of the Council of Europe's session there. I also remember returning from Armenia with him in the vehicle that picked us up from the airport. I asked Shall we drop you off at Dolphin square? He replied No, notake me to Parliament. I think that, above all, he was a workaholic. It was impossible to hold him down: he always knew that there was something that he wanted to do. Irrespective of his age and irrespective of his health, he always wanted to be working, and that is exactly what he did until the very end.
	It is a delight for me to take part in today's debate. I want to deal with a number of issues, fairly briefly. One is, of course, the Lisbon treaty. I have to say that no one was more delighted than me when the Irish voted no. I always think that, irrespective of whether one is pro or anti-European, it is good to see an institution that seems to be going at a fair speed being given a kick now and again. I tend to think, Hold it back and let people reflect. That, basically, is what the Irish said to the European Union, but now the European Union has asked the Irish to reflect. It has gone the other way, although it should not have done so.
	When the French and the Dutch people voted no, it was clearly Europe's problem, but when the Irish voted no, it was the Irish people's problem. I do not think that that is right. The hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) spoke in glowing terms about everything European. She used the words freedom and democracy many times. I began to ask myself, What about the freedoms of the Irish people? What about the democracy of the people of Ireland? Should they not be allowed to have their say? Surely their voice is as important as that of any other country.
	What we know is that there must be unanimity among the 27 countries. I was a bit miffed when I heard people in the European Union ask, How dare a small number of people from one country hold back the project? Actually, that is exactly how the project was constructed. It was constructed to allow someone to say, Think again or We are not happy about the way in which this is going, so that the project could be stopped in its tracks and we could be given an opportunity to have another look at it. I think that Europe should have considered what needed to be done next to make itself more popular in the eyes of the people.
	The hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire said that, in her eyes, everything was wonderful, and that those of us who did not quite see it her way had got it wrong. My response is that Europe has a sales pitch to deliver that it is not delivering. It should not bully people into liking it, because that does not happen. It should achieve its aim by actions, and by ensuring that through the very way in which its institutions grow up, they can be respected and liked. Then people will follow in its wake.
	What people do not want are remote politicians, unelected Commissioners, and a President whom, if he were to walk into the Chamber now, hardly anyone would recognisepoliticians, that is, never mind people in the rest of the country. European politicians must start to connect with the people. During the June elections next year, we shall all be out delivering leaflets and knocking on doors, but I think we shall all be a bit surprised if the turnout is more than 40 per cent. There was a very high turnout in the United States, where a candidate really did spark excitement. I am not talking about Mr. McCain; I am talking about President-elect Obama, who excited the American people to the extent that a whole swathe of them turned out to vote who did not usually do so.
	I believe that what has focused resentment in this country and made it concrete is the fact that people here were promised a vote on the constitution, which was taken away from them just as Tony Blair was leaving No. 10. His parting shot to the British people was, You are not having that vote. I think that that was dishonest. As we know from listening to them, the vast majority of European Union leaders talk with pride about the fact that the vast majority of the constitution is contained in the Lisbon treaty. They are not afraid to tell the people that, because they think that that is what the people want to hear.
	I have heard Hans-Gert Pttering speak at the Council of Europe. I have heard him say The flag is not there and the anthem is not therespeaking with tears in his eyes, believing that such symbols are importantbut the vast majority of what we wanted in the constitution is still there. He has no doubt that people will see that as a stepping stone towards eventually having the flag as the adopted flag of the European Union, and having the anthem as the adopted anthem.

David Burrowes: It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans), and I pay tribute to him for his wide-ranging speech. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) spoke on behalf of the Opposition at the beginning of the debate, he was concerned that the debate was developing in a ritualistic form in its early stages. The speech given by my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley, however, was wide-ranging and covered many areas of concern in relation to Europe.
	I support my hon. Friend's comments about Turkey and its progress towards accession into the EU. It is important that the goalposts that have been set are not moved during the accession negotiations. One of those goalposts has to do with Cyprus, and the need to move to reunification of that island. In an animated speech, the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) recounted her childhood memories of Berlin. She talked about a divided city, a city of walls where there was a lack of freedom of movement and travel, and sadly, that reminded me of the situation in Cyprus. The island is one of the EU's member states, but many of the concerns facing Greek and Turkish Cypriots closely resemble those that she described.
	The question of Cyprus is relevant to this debate because the EU's General Affairs and External Relations Council made particular reference to the island only yesterday, and also because of the concerns about Turkey's accession to Europe. The Council expressed regret at Turkey's failure to implement the additional protocol to the Ankara agreementone of the goalposts that have been set in place. It called on Ankara to take urgent measures in that direction and to normalise its relationship with the Republic of Cyprus.
	One of the blockages in the accession negotiations is the full implementation of the customs union agreement with the EU. If that legal agreement were implemented, it would allow Cypriot ships to use Turkish ports and fly the Cyprus flag. That element of the customs union agreement will be reviewed in the summer. The legal agreement needs to be looked at separately from the issues relating to Cyprus, but it is a key stepping stone in the process of Turkish accession to the EU.
	The Council also noted the importance of getting a just solution to the Cyprus problem on the basis of relevant UN Security Council resolutions. That is of great interest to the House and to the Government. I know that the Minister for Europe went to Cyprus shortly after her appointment, and no doubt she will be able to give the House the benefit of her experience when she responds to the debate.
	The Government are a guarantor power for Cyprus and so clearly have an interest in what happens with the island. Another reason for their interest is that there is a widespread diaspora of Cypriots in this country. Many of them, both Greek and Turkish Cypriots, landed in my constituency and have stayed there. Beyond that, the British Government have a strategic interest in Cyprus as a result of its location, and because we have sovereign bases there.
	Cyprus is also visited very often, indeed predominantly, by British citizens, many of whom choose to stay in the country. In addition, Britain's commercial interests in the island are very much to the fore. As an aside, I note that the pre-Budget report's announcement on air passenger duty has created another type of division in Cyprus. The 2,000-mile limit means that people can fly to Larnaca without the duty being imposed, whereas it is imposed on those who fly just a little further to Paphos. The Government have thereby created a disincentive for the tourist industry in Paphos, and I hope that they rectify it.
	However, the division in Cyprus goes way beyond concerns about air passenger duty. The island has faced problems and tensions for 45 years. I do not propose to go through its history today, but it is important to look at the European dimension to Cyprus, which joined the EU on 1 May 2004. It joined as a divided island, but I want to make it clear that the whole island is in the EU, although EU legislation and the rest of the acquis communautaire are suspended in the north until a solution is found.
	Turkish Cypriots are European Union citizens; they are citizens of a member state, the Republic of Cyprus. The concern that everyone has is how we can move towards solving the Cyprus problem. It is a question that I am often asked on the doorstep in my constituency, and I receive a number of communications on it. Indeed, just yesterday I received a communication from a local Cypriot on the Cyprus problem. His letter concluded that
	the Cyprus conflict is like the Gordian knot and can not be undone, in a million years. It is doomed and cursed to be the headache of all concerned.
	Sadly, that is the view of one constituent, but it is not shared by other constituents, and certainly not by leaders in Cyprus. Indeed, the prospects for solving the Cyprus problem have in many ways never looked better. We have the best opportunity to reach a solution.
	President Demetris Christofias said at the beginning of his presidency that his priority was to end the division of the island. He began talks with Mehmet Ali Talat, the leader of the Turkish Cypriots. They have a close personal and political relationship. Indeed, earlier in the debate we were talking about Euro-communists; President Christofias may well want to align himself with them. The reality is that it is in the interests of those of all political creeds and races to seek a solution to the Cyprus problem.
	The early signs were good; in a hugely symbolic gesture, barriers came down in Ledra street, a key thoroughfare in Nicosia, on 3 April 2008. That was significant. Formal talks began and are ongoing. At the beginning of the meetings on 3 September, Alexander Downer, the UN's new envoy to Cyprus, said:
	It's going to take a long time and it's going to be a difficult negotiation...But what you have here is the political will, and the political will is very good.
	Together with other hon. Members from the British Friends of Cyprus committee, I went to Cyprus two weeks ago and saw that political good will. We were not encumbered by the air passenger duty. We saw for ourselves the state of play as regards the talks. We certainly saw good will on both sides.
	It is clear that the outline of a settlement has been agreed. Under that settlement, Cyprus would be a bi-communal, bi-zonal, federal state that respects a single sovereignty and has a single political identity. The talks address very difficult questions, including the number of Turkish troops in what is probably the most militarised area in the world; the issue of settlers from mainland Turkey; and the issue of properties and the number of refugees who will be allowed to return to their pre-war homes.
	It was expected that the first chapter of the talks, on governance and power sharing, would have been dealt with by now. Unfortunately, they have taken longer than expected, and we expect the parties to move on to the next stage in a couple of weeks. They will then move on to the next chapter, on propertyan issue on which there are many problems to be overcome. However, there is certainly good will, and we urge people to ensure that all steps are taken and all efforts made to reach a conclusion. Many would say that the current opportunity is the best there has been for decades, and we must do all we can to support it.
	During the visit, colleagues and I went to a number of areas, and I want briefly to reflect on them and my assessment of the situation. We went along the buffer zonethe green linefor 3 km. It was a desperately sad experience; it would have been so in any buffer zone, but it was tragic in Cyprus. We saw on both sides of the zone parts of the city of Nicosia that have been frozen in time and are crumbling. On each side, the Cypriot national guard and the Turkish army look at each other. The tragedy was strangely tempered by a visit further along the buffer zone to the United Nations missing persons laboratory. On the one hand, it is an extremely sad situation, as many Turkish and Greek Cypriots went missing during the conflict. On the other hand, that deeply tragic situation contains the seeds of hope and, indeed, reconciliation. A project has been started on a bicommunal basis, and it is making progress. The donorsthe United Kingdom, Greece, Turkey and Germanyhave provided funding of 2.4 million to try to ensure that the truth about missing persons comes out.
	We heard that progress has been made. Since 2006, the remains of more than 450 people who lost their lives have been found, and 107 have been identified. It is hoped that over the next year a further 300 will be identified to allow families who have lost loved ones to be able to begin the grieving process after all those years. It is immensely encouraging that the project is led by the committee on a bicommunal basis. Indeed, the technicians and scientists at the laboratory come from both communities, which points the way forward for the future, and casts doubt on the communication from my Cypriot constituent saying that there was no hope in a million years, because hope has already been found by that committee and by those technicians.
	The other positive sign is what has taken place on Ledra street, which I mentioned. The opening took place on 3 April. It was closed for 44 years, and its opening is a confidence-building measure. The opportunity naturally to go from one side of Nicosia to the other and to be able to communicate with both communitiesboth communities can communicate and trade with each other, and have some normal relationsis welcome. However, it would be so much more of a confidence-building measure if it was not necessary for Cypriots to show a passport on the way through. I spoke to a councillor in Nicosia, Mrs. Kommatsis, who is in charge of the cultural restoration of Nicosia. She is a proud Cypriot and Nicosian, but she does not feel able to make that crossing, because she would have to show her passport. She considers that Cyprus as a whole is her country, and that she should not have to do so. It would be a significant confidence-building measure if passport controls were relaxed for Cypriots and EU citizens, to allow free movement, about which the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire spoke, and which her family no doubt desperately wanted in Berlin.
	There were other positive signs of restoration work in Nicosia, and it was good to see them. It was good, too, to talk to the permanent secretary at the Ministry of Education and Culture in Cyprus, and to hear about the creation of a culture of peaceful coexistence and understanding. That unit is particularly trying to understand the identity of both communities and, for the first time, it has made it an absolute priority, in relation to literature and culture, to ensure that schoolchildren better understand other communities, whether they be Greek Cypriot or Turkish Cypriot communities. Work is also under way in relation to historical dialogue, to ensure that history is properly reflected, so that as Cypriots move to the future there can be greater reconciliation. Citizenship education, too, is under way.
	Those are all positive signs, but we are concerned that greater progress should be made. The Council of the European Union has provided assistance to the north. On 26 April 2004, the General Affairs and External Relations Council declared:
	The Turkish Cypriot community have expressed their clear desire for a future within the European Union. The Council is determined to put an end to the isolation of the Turkish Cypriot community and to facilitate the reunification of Cyprus by encouraging the economic development of the Turkish Cypriot community. The Council invited the Commission to bring forward comprehensive proposals to this end with particular emphasis on the economic integration of the island and on improving contact between the two communities and with the EU.
	Real cash was provided in the form of 259 million, of which 50 million has been spent.
	It is important that that sum is spent on confidence-building measures to bring the communities together, not least in the area of cultural heritage. I was able to see for myself the damage and desecration that has taken place when I visited the Maronite community of Cyprus in the north. The Maronite community is an integral part of the island and has had a presence in Cyprus since 900 AD. Their language, Aramaic, is part of their liturgy, andthis is appropriate just before Christmasit was used by Jesus and his family. According to historical documents, there were 64 Maronite villages with a population of about 80,000 people, making it the second largest community in Cyprus after the Greek Cypriot community. Over the years of persecution, the number of Maronites living in Cyprus decreased to 500 and the number of villages decreased to four.
	I was able to visit two of those four villages, Kormakitis and Karpashia. Sadly, I was unable to visit Ayia Marina and Asomatos, because they are part of a Turkish military zone. The representative of the Maronite community, who has observer status in the Parliament in Cyprus, made the case that it would be a significant confidence-building measure if the Turkish army were to relocate from the two Maronite villages, Ayia Marina and Asomatos, and allow Maronites to return. It was positive to see rebuilding taking place in the village of Kormakitis. Maronites are coming back, but they must be encouraged further.
	The Maronite community considers itself a minority community caught in the middle of an international conflict. As a religious minority with a 1,000-year history on the island, it wants its rights to be respected.

Mark Francois: Although I am tight for time, I am delighted that I took that very pertinent intervention. I shall not attempt to compete with my right hon. Friend the shadow Foreign Secretary in defending sterling, as there could be copyright issues there. All I will do is ask the Minister to clarify the exact position of Her Majesty's Government on the euro and to make it clear which Ministers, if any, were talking to President Barroso about the possibility of giving up the pound.
	That brings me neatly on to the Lisbon treaty, which a number of Members mentioned this evening, including my hon. Friends the Members for Stone (Mr. Cash) and for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans). Thanks to the assiduous research of my right hon. Friend the Member for Wells (Mr. Heathcoat-Amory), we have at our disposal an English translation of the draft conclusions of the forthcoming EU summit. Interestingly, under the heading Lisbon Treaty, there are only two lettersPM. I find it amazing that Lord Mandelson manages to get into just about everything to do with Europe at the moment. He somehow appears to have snuck into the draft conclusions of the European summit.
	In our last debate on Europe, I had the pleasure of congratulating the Irish first on being allowed a referendum and then on having the courage to vote no in that plebiscite. Unfortunately, as some predicted at the time, they were not to be allowed to get away with that show of blatant democracy. The chair of the European Parliament's constitutional committee, Mr. Leinen, said recently:
	A second No would be a No, and then of course you could forget about the Treaty. But a first No is volatile, let's say, because it's not a clear No against Europe. Here you have a diffuse coalition of Nos. We respect it, but we have to respect as well the Yes of the other member states.
	In other words, when it comes to European integration, a yes means yes and a no also means yes. However, there are some senior people in Ireland who have begun to realise that the Irish people should be listened to. Ireland's own EU commissioner, Charlie McCreevy said:
	The Irish people said Noand that decision has to be respected by our European partners as well... Over 53 per cent. of the Irish electorate turned out, and a considerable segment of them were people who hadn't voted in the 2007 Irish General Election. So therefore, people did take the issue very seriously. That has to be respected.
	The Irish, however, are not being respected by the British Government, and if the British Government will not respect the outcome of a democratic referendum in Ireland, that should come as no real surprise, because the Government have gone to incredible lengths to deny the British people a vote of their own. As you will recall, Mr. Speaker, all parties, including the Liberal Democrats, promised a referendum on the EU constitution, which is, in effect, the present Lisbon treaty. Of those, the Conservative party is the only one to keep its promise and vote in the House for a referendum. It would be utterly undemocratic of Gordon Brown to insist that the Irish people must vote twice, while denying the British people the chance to

Graham Allen: If our babies, children and young people do not grow up with adequate social and emotional skills, we are storing up immense problems for our future. Some of the symptoms are teenage pregnancy, antisocial behaviour, drug and drink problems, a lifetime on benefits and educational underachievement.
	Social and emotional skills are the bedrock of humanity the key to turning all these current problems around and producing young people who not only will achieve educationally, hold down a job and be good citizens, but, perhaps most importantly of all, will be the great parents of tomorrow, thus breaking the intergenerational cycle of underachievement and dysfunction that so blights constituencies such as mine. It is therefore with great pleasure that I congratulate Ministers and officials in the Department for Children, Schools and Families on driving the changes in the national curriculum that will mean that, in the years 11 to 16, life skills will be properly taught to all those who need them.
	I have already been to see the new Minister about this issue, and I know of her deep commitment to and interest in this subject. She knows that I mean no disrespect to her when I pay a special tribute to her predecessor, the Minister for Schools and Learners, my right hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Jim Knight), who painstakingly pioneered the thinking that led to this breakthrough, which will have such stunning implications for the children in my constituency and elsewhere.
	However, I have one minor criticism to level at the Minister, which I hope that she will take in the spirit in which it is offered. Can we please not talk about PHSE, SRE and all the other baffling professional acronyms that make education policy so impenetrable? This more than any other subject is something it is essential for parents to understand, as it is about developing the skills that will help our young people navigate through the difficult times and decisions of their lives. In the couple of years before the proposals are implemented nationwide, will the Minister have a think about whether we can please call the subject 11-to-16 life skills, so that everyone knows what we are trying to achieve?
	We are already using the expression 11-to-16 life skills in Nottingham, and it is one intervention of about a dozen that make up Nottingham's early intervention package. That package involves a circle of measures from birth to 18, based around the whole life cycle, that can then be repeated until the intergenerational cycle of underachievement is broken.
	We are delighted that the Government have given added weight to our local efforts by ensuring that 11-to-16 life skills will now be included in the national curriculum, probably starting in September 2011. In Nottingham however, we cannot wait. Every year we wait means 214 more teenage pregnancies in my constituency, another 1,000 young people leaving school without the qualifications they should have obtained, more victims of drug and drink abuse and more wasted opportunities and lives. So, we intend to start our 11-to-16 life skills curriculum with next September's secondary school intake. We will start with two of our new academies, plus any secondary schools whose heads wish to get their young people prepared ahead of the Government's timetable.
	We would appreciate continuing Government encouragement at both ministerial and official level. I pay tribute to the officials in the Minister's Department for the help and advice that they have already given us. Led by our excellent new director of children's services, Ian Curryer, we intend to seize the advice and opportunities on offer and to make the fullest use of them. In her reply, will the Minister perhaps let us know what assistance not financial assistance, but help and encouragementthe Department can offer as we seek pioneer the curriculum?
	We will also develop locally, but with help from the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and others such as the Department, the curriculum content of 11-to-16 life skills. There is no reason why we cannot come up with a synthesis of secondary SEALsocial and emotional aspects of learning at secondary schoolsex and relationship education, personal, social and health education, citizenship and so on that is more than the sum of its parts and genuinely helps build the social and emotional capabilities of our teenagers. Perhaps the Minister could help us to pilot that curriculum, since lessons for the Government's roll-out will surely become evident if we start early in Nottingham.
	Just as we initiated primary SEAL, the local strategic partnership, One Nottingham, will put in whatever resources it takes to give 11-to-16 life skills the support they require. We expect a project initiation document to come to the One Nottingham board in January with proposals on the roll-out of 11-to-16 life skills and a funding request to back them up. The proposals will include the in-depth training of a critical mass of teachers who can confidently and clearly pass on the core life skills that our young people need. Can the Minister tell us what assistance might be available to give the teacher training required? We will fund it, but we need the Department's expertise behind us.
	Partnership working is central to our success. Life skills are a public health issue and a crime reduction issue. They impinge on housing, employment and communities. They are everybody's problem. For many young people, 11-to-16 life skills will be a natural progression from the primary SEAL programme, which has been implemented in every primary school in our city. That programme teaches young people how to interact with their fellow pupils, to learn the skills they need to progress and to resolve arguments without violence as well as many other basic concepts that, sadly, all too many do not learn at home. Taking primary SEAL forward into 11-to-16 life skills should be a seamless transition, giving many of those youngsters the skills that they do not currently get at home.
	For young people at secondary school in many areas, it may not appear necessary to teach what it is like to have a family, what the responsibilities are when they have a baby of their own or what it is to have and sustain a relationship. Many of these things are second nature to most people in the UK because of how they have been parented. Sadly, there are other places where they have to be taught, and if children are not given the chance to learn them either at home or at school, the whole of our society will reap the consequences. The high level of teenage pregnancy may be the most obvious consequence, but as children's young lives unfold, many other symptoms become apparent. Young people who are marginalised and excluded from learning will tend to disrupt classes, while others will interact all too often with the criminal law in their teenage years.
	We should beware of having a false division between social and emotional capabilities and academic abilities. All those calling for improved social and emotional education want higher academic attainment, but the latter can never be sustained without the former being in place. Pressure, exhortation and supervision can crank up scores only so much; the key to continued success for every child, not just those close to some arbitrary benchmark, is to produce, from the earliest years, better raw material. Social and emotional capability is the bedrock on which all academic achievement is founded and can grow.
	The Department must be careful that, in its understandable pursuit of academic standards, it does not unwittingly squeeze out of the local curriculum, particularly in challenged schools, the very social and emotional learning on which rising and sustainable academic attainment must be based. Capable, bright, interactive, rounded children will always attain academically to a much greater degree than those who do not have the social and emotional basics.
	Those basics need to be taught to children, ideally by effective parenting, particularly in the 0 to 3 age group, and any deficiencies must be made good by early intervention, before and during the school years. I hope that the Minister will comment on how secondary heads already struggling to meet the standards agenda can be helped to make room and time for the social and emotional skills upon which rising standards must be built.
	In proposing 11-to-16 life skills for all, the Government are to be congratulated on thinking strategically. It is the Government's role not only to react to crises, such as a child abuse case or poor GCSE results, but to look at the long term. They must enact the strategy that will build out the problem and break the intergenerational repetition of ignorance and failure. The Government did that with Sure Start, and they are now doing the same thing with 11-to-16 life skills. They are a small step away from completing the jigsaw and proposing nationally a holistic early intervention package. We have modelled such a package in Nottingham and have tried to establish a 0-to-18 cycle of interventions in our city. Perhaps there are lessons to be learned from what we have done. By putting in place arrangements such as I have described, we will not only secure the future for every current child, but by creating the great parents of tomorrow, we will break once and for all the intergenerational cycle in constituencies like mine.
	I shall conclude by congratulating Ministers in the Department again on their foresight in bringing forward proposals for an 11-to-16 life skills agenda in the not-too-distant future. In my city of Nottingham, we are trying to pioneer these ideas even before they come into law under legislation passed by this place, and I hope that we will continue to have Ministers' support. There has been a great partnership effort in our city and we have made great progress, but we continue to need Government support. If we get that support, the prize is a fantastic one. It is that children growing up today can become the most fantastic parents of tomorrow. That will help to reduce the massive amounts of time, effort, energy and money that would go into picking up the pieces if we neglect the future of our young children.
	Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, for hearing the debate tonight.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) on securing this debate on an issue with which he is very much involved; he has been to see me about it. I thank him for his work on the subject. I am sure that it is work for which his constituents are very grateful.
	In the children's plan, we committed to giving every child a world-class education, and to making this country the best place in the world in which to grow up. As far as I am concerned, the two must go hand in hand; we cannot have one without the other. Qualifications are extremely importantnever more so than in the highly skilled 21st-century job market that Sandy Leitch projected two years ago. The power of education lies in shaping futures, and in giving people better and brighter prospects. Knowledge and technical skills must go hand in hand with life skills.
	Children cannot learn to their full potential if they are not safe, secure and happy. To achieve at school, they need a good group of friends, a stable home life and encouragement from their parents or guardians. Where young people do not have that support, we look to local services, including schools, to provide stability and structure.The ability to relate to others better, to be organised and punctual, and to manage conflict is essential to fulfilling and satisfying relationships. In a rapidly changing society of instant communication, with new career possibilities and developing leisure pursuits and methods of social interaction, we need to make sure that we give young people the skills that they need to develop, and to make the right choices in every aspect of their lives, so that they can become confident adults and responsible citizens.
	To respond to the changing world around us, we have introduced a new secondary curriculum. Teachers are the best judges of their pupils. They know about their interests, aptitudes and backgrounds, how to get the best out of them, and how to make the most of the resources available in their schools and localities. We have retained all the national curriculum subjects, and have put an emphasis on the core subjects. We have introduced functional skills, so that high standards can be achieved with regard to the central aspects of learning. However, within that framework, the new curriculum allows teachers greater flexibility to tailor their learning programmes to the specific needs of their pupils.
	There is more time for students who need a bit of extra support to catch up, and for those who need it to receive vital one-to-one tuition. There is more space for the most able to pursue their learning more independently, so that they can get ahead. The curriculum also builds in more time for the valuable skills that my hon. Friend talked about, so that we can encourage all young people to develop their personal, learning and thinking skills, and the social and emotional skills needed for learning, personal development and well-being. The new secondary curriculum will encourage students to make connections between subjects through curriculum dimensions. Unifying themes such as cultural diversity and identity, healthy lifestyles, and enterprise and entrepreneurship not only make lessons more relevant and engaging, but help young people to make sense of subjects and how they relate to the world around them.
	The new personal learning and thinking skills framework will ensure a more consistent approach to softer skills such as perseverance, confidence, resilience and learning to work well in a team. By fostering more independence in learning, and with a real focus on the broader skills essential to life and work, we are investing young people with more responsibility to make choices on all aspects of their lives, including their education, health and safety, from an earlier age. By raising the participation age in education, employment and training, and by opening up new learning routes for those aged 14 to 19, we are ensuring that every young person studies for longer in a relevant and engaging way that best suits them, and can gain a range of broader skills that will see them to success.
	Increasingly, as employers and others in the community become more involved with 21st-century schools, young people are benefiting from a wider range of activities. Enterprise education, work experience and after-school activities such as sport, music and drama are all helping young people to relate to one another, to develop their communication skills, and to work well in a team. All are vital skills for later life.
	However, our vision of 21st-century schools goes beyond attainment and professional skills. It is a vision of a learning community, in which services can come together around a child to support them in all aspects of their growth and development. Better links between children's services and schools are helping to provide more consistent support to all young people, and more targeted support to those who need it. The larger the number of professionals talking to one another, the greater the capacity for spotting problems early and intervening.
	I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North for his work on early intervention in Nottingham, which is designed to deal with the specific challenges faced by his locality. I wish him every success with the implementation of the 11 to 16 life skills curriculum in Nottingham. In response to his inquiry about what further support my Department can provide, we have already offered a bespoke programme for Nottingham to support the implementation of the curriculum, and that offer now lies with the local authority for consideration.
	As for a curriculum which combines PSHE, citizenship, SRE and other elements, I am delighted that schools in Nottingham wish to develop their own curriculum, which is specifically tailored to the needs of local pupils. The bespoke programme on offer will support schools in designing the whole curriculum to meet the needs of their pupils, and in developing particular subjects or groups of subjects within the overall curriculum framework. A more flexible secondary curriculum, new learning routes and broader activities in schools are therefore helping young people to relate their academic studies to the real world. The new PSHE education programme of study will give young people the opportunity to study life skills and issues in their own right, and to tackle some of the issues they face as they enter adulthoodfinances, health, and sex and relationships.
	PSHE is an extremely important subject, and it should not be treated as secondary to the rest of a young person's education. That is why we recently took the decision to put PSHE on a statutory footing, and we have asked Sir Alasdair MacDonald, head teacher at Morpeth secondary school in Tower Hamlets, to conduct an independent review into the best way to do that. My hon. Friend has asked whether PSHE or SRE could be called life skills. Although Sir Alasdair has not specifically been asked to look at that question in the review, I am sure that he will make recommendations on the way in which we describe that important area of education if there are good reasons for doing so.
	As we develop the statutory core entitlement, we will take as our starting point the existing non-statutory programmes of study for personal and economic well-being in key stages 3 and 4. For key stages 1 and 2, the review will take account of Jim Rose's work on PSHE as part of the primary curriculum review. Jim Rose's interim report, published yesterday, recommends the strengthening of the personal development element of the curriculum by building a framework for the personal skills and attitudes that all children should develop throughout their schooling. That would come under the area of learning called Understanding physical health and well-being. By making PSHE statutory, we will ensure greater consistency across the national picture, so that all young people benefit from those vital skills.
	All PSHE programmes must be flexible enough to allow individual schools to tailor their curriculum and teaching to their own pupils and parents, and to the ethos of the school. As my hon. Friend rightly pointed out, training and support for teachers is crucial. We have made 2 million of funding available each year to train teachers and professionals delivering PSHE in schools. We will also encourage schools to use in-service training to improve staff awareness of the duty to promote well-being, particularly the importance of high-quality PSHE.
	We are working with the Training and Development Agency for Schools to develop a specialist route through initial teacher training, and we will update the existing SRE and drugs and alcohol education guidance for schools. Wider Government programmes such as the duty to promote well-being, and the healthy schools agenda will be used to drive improvements in PSHE. My hon. Friend asked how we help head teachers to make time for social and emotional education while they are working to meet the standards agenda. In my mind, the two go hand in hand. Wider learning, development and well-being are a vital part of raising standards in schools to provide a first-class education for our young people.
	The school report card will provide stronger accountability to parents and local communities on how their schools are progressing across the board. The consultation on report cards that we launched yesterday will look specifically at how schools promote wider well-being alongside attainment. As we consider school reform, we must remember the vital role of parents, who are an enormous influence when it comes to raising the aspirations of their children and instilling the values and behaviour that will stand them in good stead later in life. Given that children spend only 15 per cent. of their time in school, parents are our most important ally in their children's development. Through technology, personal contacts in school, and forums for parents to express their views, we are encouraging parents to become more involved in their child's education and development.